Actually, here's a good article (in English) on Kalashnikov's prototypes. He was an accomplished gun designer even before AK-47, although none of his earlier guns went into serial production.
http://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/...ikhail-kalashnikovs-great-firearms-portfolio/
Everything I've read says the exact opposite. He had submitted subgun designs previously, but the ministry said his designs were so primitive that they weren't even worth looking at.
It just so happened that Kalashnikov worked for the man who was heading up the assault rifle trials. It also just so happened that he was assisted by a skilled engineer named Zaitsev. It also just so happened that at that time Hugo Schmeisser, the man who designed the Stg-44, had been captured by the Russians in WWII and was currently assisting them in their small arms designs.
It also just so happens that the records of Schmeisser's whereabouts during the trials and design phases leading up to them are still classified by the Russians. Although Kalashnikov did finally admit that Schmeisser had helped with the design.
The engineer who evaluated the AK 46 rejected it, but Kalashnikov's boss revised his report to let Kalashnikov stay in the running. After which they assign him more help, from an engineer who is also one of the judges. All these men had access to all the entry designs, including this one by Bulkin:
And this is what Kalashnikov shows up with at the next trial:
Which looks absolutely nothing like his AK 46:
So they chose Kalashnikov's design over Bulkin's (despite the AK 46 breaking during testing), then next time Kalashnikov shows up with a slightly refined version of Bulkin's design. And to even get that far, he needed the help of three highly qualified small arms engineers, two of which were judges, and one of which was in charge of the trials (all three were not supposed to help the designers, and they were supposed to keep each design confidential from the other entrants to protect their intellectual property).
It's unclear what exactly Kalashnikov was doing during all this. Incidentally, the widow of the man in charge of the trials published his memoirs a few years back. Kalashnikov was so afraid of what might be in them (he had said some not so flattering things about Kalashnikov in the past) that he tried to bribe his widow into not publishing the memoirs. My guess is he was probably told to go sit in a corner and stay out of the way, and that that's what he was afraid was in the memoirs, a confession that he had not made any contribution to the design. Then again, that's speculation on my part, but that's certainly the way it looks.
I'm sorry, I know this is off topic, but it sticks in my craw to hear people sing that man's praises. Bulkin deserves credit for the AK47, and if Russia had not been communist he would have sued everyone's pants off and won. Even then though, it's hard to say how much help he was getting from Schmeisser. Even the idea for the AK47 was uninspired, as the Russians simply wanted to make an Stg-44 clone that incorporated a rotating bolt, which they learned to make from a captured M1 carbine. And even then they needed to capture and keep prisoner a terminally ill man and force him to help them in their blundering quest, despite the fact the poor guy was dying and just wanted to see his family. The only thing Russia deserves credit for is being the first to capture the greatest small arms engineer of the first half of the twentieth century then work him to death.
